BBC approved the Panasonic AF101 for full HD television acquisition (+ tested with Voigtländer)
Good news for the Micro Four Thirds system. BBC approved the AG-AF101 as a HD specialist cameras. You may don’t know that only a few cameras are on the BBC list. That includes the much more expensive ARRI cameras, the Sony’s CineAlta F35 and the Red modular cameras. See the full (short) list of approved cameras -> Download .pdf. Low budget documentary filmmakers will be very happy to read that news. But there is only one “limitation”. You have to record the images on the external recorder to capture footage at 50Mbps via HDMI. (Read the article at Dvuser.co.uk)
You can get the AG-AF100(or 101 or 102) at BHphoto (Click here) or eBay (Click here).
Dvuser.co.uk (Click here) tested the Voigtlander 25mm F0.95 Micro 4/3rd lens on the Panasonic AF101 camcorder. Is the lens good enough for video? Nigel Cooper says :”I’ve been shooting with the Panasonic AF101 with the Voigtlander 25mm MFT lens for some weeks now and to say I’m impressed is an understatement. The quality that the Voigtlander optics produces is truly amazing. As for the Bokeh, it is truly amazing. At F0.95 you can achieve the shallowest depth-of-field; it’s incredible and it yields some incredibly artistic results.” The final rating is 5 start of 5! Thanks Nigel for your very detailed review!
The best thing is that now there are plenty of Nokton lenses in Stock in European eBay stores (Click here). All new and with the normal price (which is 899 Euro). Click on the shop names: Foto Mundus, infoto2, infoto2, eu-shphoto, deutscher-digitalhandel (ships worldwide!). Our US readers can buy from Europe only because US stores do not have them in Stock. BHphoto accepts preorders (for a very good price) but they still don’t know when they will have them in Stock (that’s what they told to me).
UPDATE: In France you can find the Nokton for 749 Euro only at lapetiteboutiquephoto.com. Don’t know why they are much cheaper than other stores but I have been assured that this is a very reputable store!
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Recent comments
Comment from darth: as far as i know, the normal price in eu...
Comment from michel v: 749 is the actual price for the lens in ...
Comment from Tulio: The parentheses are quite important ( wi...
Comment from Greek_m43: It doesn't have to be through hdmi, that...
Calvin
2 years ago |Congratulations to Panasonic for the recognition of such a powerful camera, Voigtlander for their amazing lenses and BBC for the addition of such a fantastic camera to their lineup.
And Hopefully, increase professional adoption means more and better lens for the rest of us Indie / Students.
Now, Voitgtlander and Panasonic, Please just make your Lens and Camera respectively available? Thanks!
NiKo
2 years ago |I’m an happy owner of the Voigt 25mm f/0.95 since a few days (thanks to admin btw), I can just confirm all the good being said about it. It’s probably one of the top lens I ever own, the build is fantastic and the sharpness starting as soon as f/1.4 is incredible. f/0.95 is soft but still usable. For the price, it’s a must have. I recently saw Amazon FR having 5 of these in stock btw.
frosti7
2 years ago |Niko, dont u find it slow or tiring to focus?
I am using a 50 f2 manual focus lens and its still hard for me (to focus right and fast)
NiKo
2 years ago |Well the course of the focus ring is perfectly suited for my taste — not too short neither too long, and using the magnifier button on the e-pl2 it’s very easy to focus efficiently (with a little bit of training, of course).
Sure if your thing is action/sports shooting (kids included) it’s nearly impossible to use but for portrait and and landscape it’s amazing. I’ll try to use it for a street session tonight, I’ll keep you informed (hyperfocal is my friend). The only caveat is to not expect much of it at f/0.95 in terms of sharpness and overall IQ but as I said starting at f/1.4 it’s getting good and purely amazing at f/4 (ultimate sharpness).
For the price, it’s simply awesome.
Frank
2 years ago |The bbc accepting this as an official hd camera is great as they are quite picky about that. I spoke to a bbc guy once about this and they do not just look at resolution to accept something as hd. He then said, if I remember correctly, that anythin with a sensor smaller than 1″ would never be accepted as hd anyway. But i am not too sure about that, it was a while ago.
Irfan
2 years ago |Why are you speculating when the full BBC list is here?
http://www.dvuser.co.uk/images/img/news/bbc-approve-ag-af101/bbc-approved-hd-cameras.pdf
Af100 is accepted but only if it’s using external recorder with 50mbits or more.
Greek_m43
2 years ago |It doesn’t have to be through hdmi, that makes no sense. And this is old news haha
Tulio
2 years ago |The parentheses are quite important ( with an external recorder using a bitrate of 50Mbps or above )
It would be so easy for Panasonic to allow 50Mbps MJPEG as Vitaly done to the GH1. but Hey.
I doubt they could tell the difference anyway. It is a bit os snobism.
I remember the days when some UK broadcasters would not allow Digital Betacam because it was “compressed” ( it is. )
and advised all their suppliers to use Panasonic D5 instead. this nonsense lasted a bit over one year.
michel v
2 years ago |749 is the actual price for the lens in France, as given by Cosina’s importer.
It is the price I paid in a shop in January, and the price you’ll pay on Amazon FR and other places, so it’s not just the website you linked.
darth
2 years ago |as far as i know, the normal price in europe has always been 750 euros… only lately, due to shortages, has the price been bumped up to 900-1000e